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http://www.jstor.org The Alcazar of and Mudejar Architecture

D. FAIRCHILD RUGGLES

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Abstract cessive Christian rulers. The was built inmany phases by Muslim and Christian patrons (Fig. 1). In its present state, The Seville Alcazar was an Islamic foundation that re it is a confusing mix of richly ornamented courtyards and ceived additions and renovations in the significant fourteenth halls, one style added to another so that the palace can, in century by Alfonso XI and again by Pedro the Cruel. In both some parts, be read like archaeological strata. These halls are cases the changes were realized in a Mudejar style, reflecting es surrounded that are Andalusi the demographic and cultural continuity of Seville and by gardens identifiably although of indeterminate date. Each of the differs in pecially of the artisanal class. But the motivations underlying palace's phases the selection of this style were different for each monarch. date and style: taifa, Almohad, Gothic, Mudejar, late Renais over Alfonso celebrated the triumph of his Christian coalition sance. To some extent this mixture is the natural result of con an Islamic coalition, and commissioning a work of Mudejar struction that went on for five hundred years in which one architecture allowed him to seize and appropriate a subject succeeded the as one decade succeeds Islamic culture in much the same way as he had seized Islamic style naturally other, the next. But there is an of under territory. But Pedro's use of the Mudejar style was less an assumption inevitability tagonistic, for he was advised by Muhammad V of , lying this model that I would like to question, asking instead who was in exile under his protection. Pedro had grown are a or living to what degree such style changes "natural" "auto up in Seville surrounded by Islamic culture. Thus, his decision matic" consequence of the march of time, and to what degree to adopt the style expressed an important aspect of Mudejar reflect conscious shifts in cultural and values. If his own identity that emphasized his Andalusian roots and they political has the sense of transcended religious associations. style meaning?in giving physical expression can we as to human values and identity?then what meaning cribe to the adoption of Islamicate forms and motifs by the Medieval Iberia from the eighth through the fifteenth Christian patron of the Alcazar of Seville in the mid-four century was a crossroads where two powerful cultures met teenth century? and intermingled. Christian and Islamic cultures have been The original Alcazar was built in the tenth century in contraposed in historical literature as well as popular contem an area outside the old Roman walls of Seville. There are no porary description, where differences in religion and cultural remains from this period.4 When al-Andalus fragmented into practices have been emphasized.1 Although since the 1980s multiple princely states (taifas) in the eleventh century, Se many historians following in the footsteps of Am?rico Castro ville became the capital of the richest and most powerful have focused instead on the dynamics of convivencia (coexist state, ruled by the Abbadid dynasty (1023-1091). Seville was ence), the frontier between the Christian north and Islamic an advantageous site for a capital because it was situated on south is still demarcated with a solid line when mapped on the Guadalquivir, the only navigable river in . With paper.2 But as all Mediterraneanists know, the existence of access upstream to Cordoba (the former Umayyad capital and political domains (by no means as sharply defined as maps still a large city in the eleventh and twelfth centuries) as well mean a suggest) does not necessarily cultural barrier. There as downstream to the sea and trade with North Africa and the were plenty of Muslims in the "Christian" kingdoms, plenty Mediterranean, Seville thrived economically and politically. of Christians in Islamic al-Andalus, and minority Jewish com In the Abbadid phase, the Alcazar was expanded westward munities in both. Moreover, theMuslim and Christian commu and the new part was named the Qasr al-Mubarak (Palace of nities themselves consisted of diverse sects, political entities, Good Fortune). This part of the palace survived the subse and ethnic groups.3 This cultural hybridity is reflected in the quent expansions and remodelings and formed a principal architecture and art, from Mozarabic churches like San Miguel element in the axial organization of the later Gothic and de Escalada near Leon, to converted and remodeled mosques Mudejar phases.5 such as Cristo de la Luz (Bib Mardum) in Toledo, toMudejar When the princely states proved too weak to defend them such as the Alcazar of Seville. selves against the Christian kingdoms of Navarre and Leon, The Alcazar of Seville offers an opportunity to study the new, more powerful dynasties from Morocco took charge. The different political circumstances and motivations prompting second of these was the Almohad dynasty (1147-1237) from the adoption of a visibly Islamic style in the patronage of sue , which adopted Seville as its Iberian capital. In this

GESTA XLIII/2 ? The International Center of Medieval Art 2004 87 FIGURE 1. Seville, Alcazar, 10th century to present (drawing: author).

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FIGURE 2. Alcazar, in the Casa de Contrataci?n, early 12th century (photo: author).

88 FIGURE 3. Patio del late llthor 12th Alcazar, Yeso, early century (photo: FIGURE 4. Alcazar, Hall of Justice, ca. 1140-1150 (photo: author). author).

phase, several handsome gardens were built in the Alcazar, shields of Castile and Leon as well as those of the Order of with the was which, together outlying gardens, enclosed by the Banda, a Christian order of knights created a few years an extensive wall.6 One of these was the beautiful four-part before the Battle of Salado, making the dynastic identity and with garden deeply sunken quadrants that forms the heart of Castilian patronage affiliations explicit. But the ornamental what is today an office of public works and finances, the program of the hall communicated a different association Casa de Contrataci?n (Fig. 2). Another is the so-called Patio altogether. The walls have a tripartite structure in which del Yeso with its and at two rectangular pool least walls either wide central doorways or blind niches are flanked by preserving their original arches and delicate stucco tracery narrower blind arches. In the center of the chamber there is A now (Fig. 3). third garden, called the Ba?os de Do?a Mar?a a low basin with a jet and a channel from which water flows is known Padilla, archaeologically but buried beneath Gothic toward the garden and its large tank. The fountain's intricate to the vaulting dating mid-thirteenth century.7 In 1248 Se stucco with vegetal (ataurique) motifs and the arrangement ville was conquered Ferdinand III of Castile (d. 1252). His of three arches framed bands of were by " by inscription Alfonso called "El son, X, Sabio made Seville his capital, clearly drawn from an Islamicate repertoire and would have the inhabited Alcazar, and remodeled it in the Gothic style.8 been read as such by all who visited Alfonso in his throne In the mid-fourteenth century a new style was introduced. room.9 Alfonso XI won a (1312-1350), king of Castile-Leon, had This use of Islamic motifs in non-Muslim settings is called the major victory against Islamic kingdom of Granada at the Mudejar, from the Arabic mudajjan, meaning "domesticated," of Battle Salado in 1340, and to celebrate he built the Hall of as in a subject people. The term was first used in 1859 to de Justice next to the Patio del just Yeso (Fig. 4). This Hall of scribe an artistic style, but it derives from a demographic con Justice was an to antechamber the garden and functioned as dition caused by the Reconquest.10 As Christian rulers won Alfonso's throne room. The chamber walls displayed the larger swathes of territory along the loosely defined frontier

89 bishops adopted the visible signs of Islamic culture in their palaces and treasuries has been discussed by Karl Werck meister and Jerrilynn Dodds, among others, who believe that such appropriations were signs of triumph in which Christian ity expressed its domination over a subjugated al-Andalus.12 This interpretation explains why Christian patrons eagerly adopted Islamic luxury objects and richly colored textiles in such highly charged objects as reliquaries that preserved the remains of Christian martyrs who were killed in al-Andalus for such acts as publicly cursing the Prophet. To use an Islamic silver or ivory box with Arabic inscriptions for the martyr's :S^ ^9?HBBEBHHBHHHI?? relics was a deliberate act of inversion. However, triumpha lism does not explain the phenomenon of the Mudejar style, in which Christian patrons did not simply appropriate and convert existing Islamic objects, but actually commissioned new art in the Islamic style. Furthermore, in the built environment where astounding instances of the Mudejar style exist, the relation of body to object is very different. The architecture is of a scale that en velops human inhabitants and dominates them, not vice versa. Alfonso XI's throne room contained him, mirrored him, and served as the physical extension of his body and his identity. It could even, in his absence, stand for him as his most visible sign. So why would a Christian king choose an Islamicate FIGURE 5. Sahag?n, San Tirso, just before 1123 (photo: author). Mudejar style for this expression of self? Did he appropriate this style for architecture in the same way that Islamic objects were acquired and used as emblems of conquest? that divided al-Andalus from the northern kingdoms of Leon, In many respects, despite the difference in scale, the Castile, Navarre, Aragon, and Catalonia, entire communities triumphalist explanation works perfectly well for Alfonso XI of Muslims stayed on, often governed under surrender trea and the Hall of Justice. He had built the hall just after 1340, ties. Although they were subject to new lords, laws, and taxes, the year he led a coalition of the kingdoms of Castile, Leon, not only the individuals but also the social fabric that united Navarre, Aragon, and Portugal against the combined forces them continued intact in many cases. Thus, there was a conti of the Nasrids of Granada and theMerinids of Morocco in the nuity of marriage practices, names, clothing, cuisine, religious great Battle of Salado, which ended seven years of conflict observance, daily economy, city plans, and artisanal expertise. and subdued the Nasrids. It also greatly enriched the coffers Significant examples of churches and other structures of Castile-Leon.13 His Hall of Justice was built to celebrate built in cities with large Mudejar populations evince the or the victory of a Christian coalition against an Islamic coalition: namental elegance and even the structural typology of Islamic Seville versus Granada. If the triumphalist rationale holds true, architecture. San Tirso, built just before 1123 in Sahag?n (near then he chose theMudejar style for his victory monument be Leon), is a brick church with a projecting eastern apse whose cause it allowed him to seize and appropriate Islamic culture exterior facade is articulated with stacked rows of blind arches in much the same way as he had seized and appropriated (Fig. 5). This abstract program in which a simple architec Islamic territory. The political history of the Iberian penin tural unit?the brick?constituted both the edifice's structure sula is rife with such contests; however, the lines were rarely and its nonfigural ornamentation was typical of Islamic and so clearly drawn between Muslim and Christian. Mudejar architecture. Similarly, the thirteenth-century church For example, a decade later, when Alfonso XI's son, of San Pedro in Teruel (Aragon) has a rectangular brick tower Pedro of Castile-Leon (r. 1350-1369), occupied the throne, that resembles mosque minarets of al-Andalus. It has bands the Christian kings were at each other's throats while Gra of sawtooth brick, window arches recessed within multiple nada suffered internal feuds of its own. In 1359 Muhammad frames, and glazed ceramic inlay.11 Such buildings, Islamic in V, the Nasrid ruler of Granada, was forced into exile, and he style but built for Christian patrons, are Mudejar. took refuge in the Alcazar of Seville. When he regained his Among the prevailing explanations for the Mudejar throne three years later, he did so thanks to the support of phenomenon, the most sensitive interprets the Christian ap Pedro. Like Muhammad, Pedro needed allies: his French wife, propriation of Islamic practices and objects as an act of tri Blanche, hated him and had an adulterous relationship with umphalism. The question of why Christian kings and church his stepbrother Fadrique, and his half brother Enrique was

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FIGURE 6. Alcazar, Mudejar entrance facade, 1364 (photo: author).

trying to kill him with support from Aragon. The only solu by God's grace King of Castile and Leon, has caused these tion Pedro could seem to find was to try to murder anyone Alc?zares and palaces and these facades to be built, which who posed a threat?including Blanche, his aunt, various half was done in the year 1402 [sic; 1364]."15 This provides a be brothers, a cousin, and his treasurer. This propensity for using ginning date for Pedro's construction. Similarly, an Arabic murder to solve political conflict earned him the name of Pedro inscription on wooden doors in the Hall of the Ambassadors the Cruel. provides the end date of 1366. In addition to the date, the long In the 1360s Pedro significantly rebuilt the Alcazar. Like Arabic inscription names Pedro as patron, designates the hall Alfonso XI, he too chose the Mudejar style, but unlike Al as serving "the honor and grandeur of his ennobled and for fonso, he had no triumphalist reasons for doing so. To the con tunate ambassadors," and states that artisans from Toledo made trary, his greatest ally was the Nasrid sultan, Muhammad. the doors.16 Beginning with the Alcazar's monumental facade, whose Pedro created for himself a sumptuous palace in the Mu inscription dates it to 1364, Pedro used a clearly Islamicate dejar style. The fact that it was built in something less than vocabulary of polylobed arches, splayed voussoirs divided by five years suggests that he had a clear vision of what he wanted thin bands of green tile, ornamental stucco in a pattern and that it was carried out according to that well-conceived (interlacing arches that extend to suggest a screen), an over plan. Everyone who sees the palace is struck by the resem hanging eave of wood carved inmuqarnas (stalactite vaulting), blance to the of Granada, from modern visitors to and both Arabic and Latin inscriptions to adorn this entrance the late-fifteenth-century traveler Jer?nimo M?nzer, who vis into his palace (Fig. 6). The facade is divided into three parts ited both Granada and Seville in 1494-1495, just a few years of which the center is largely original while the flanking parts after the final conquest of Granada by Ferdinand and Isabel. in brick are of later date. The repeating Arabic inscriptions Indeed, M?nzer launched his description of the Alcazar by that alternate between the columns of the middle level (be comparing it with the Alhambra in style and size.17 The simi tween the first-floor door and the second-story windows) read, larity begins with the Alcazar's palace facade, which bears a "The empire for God."14 In the interlace above are Pedro's resemblance to the facade of the Patio of the Cuarto Dorado emblems: the castle (Castile), lion (Leon), and a sash (Order at the Alhambra (Fig. 7). Although the Cuarto Dorado's archi of the Banda). Above the windows, an Arabic inscription in tectural frame is older, the stucco decoration of the facade Kufic script in blue tile reading "There is no Conqueror but seems mostly to pertain to about 1370?or at least not before God" is repeated four times both right-side up and upside 1369.18 After Muhammad, who had lived at the Seville Alcazar down. Framing this band is a Latin foundation inscription, "The while in exile from 1359 to 1362, was restored to his throne, highest, noblest, and most powerful conqueror, Don Pedro, he sent artisans from Granada to Seville to work on the

91 FIGURE 8. Alcazar, Hall of the Ambassadors, redecorated 1366 (photo: author).

which was redecorated by Pedro in 1366, resembles the Al hambra's Hall of the Ambassadors (Fig. 9), which was begun by Yusuf I and completed by Muhammad V. In the Alcazar a colorful glazed tile dado runs along the lowest portion of the walls, the upper portion of which is revetted with richly pat terned stucco. At the center of each wall, a rectangular frame FIGURE 7. Granada, Alhambra, Cuarto Dorado, ca. 1370 facade, (photo: encloses a half-round arched frame that encloses a smaller author). rectangular frame surrounding three horseshoe arches on marble columns. A row of regularly spaced small windows with delicate stucco tracery runs along the uppermost part of Alcazar for Pedro. It is tempting to identify the Seville facade the walls. The balconies were added in the sixteenth century as a derivative of the Alhambra facade, but since both Pedro and the dome, which dates to 1427, replaced an and Muhammad were engaged in remodeling their antiquated earlier dome constructed for Pedro.20 The hall conforms to palaces, it is quite possible that the Seville facade predated the architectural typology of an Islamic qubba (a domed square, comparable works at the Alhambra. Comparisons are compli usually open on four sides). With respect to the typology, the cated by the fact that many of the Alhambra's halls and gar balance of tile dado and stucco walls, and the framing of the dens were remodeled or redecorated not only by Nasrid but tripartite scheme of the wall openings, the Alcazar's Hall of also by later patrons, making it nearly impossible to assign a the Ambassadors and the Alhambra's Hall of the Ambassadors single date to any of the Alhambra's palaces. clearly follow the same or similar models. The respective chronology of the Alhambra and the Al At the Alcazar, as at the Alhambra, there is the same re cazar is complicated and occasionally runs counter to the re liance on a modular unit of a large, open courtyard surrounded ceived wisdom that the Alhambra (and, by extension, Islamic by smaller, roofed chambers. These include the Patio del Le?n culture) "influenced" the Alcazar (Christian culture playing a and the Patio de las Mu?ecas, which received two upper passive role as receiver).19 Some of Muhammad's patronage stories and a glass roof in the nineteenth century. Principal at the Alhambra clearly occurred after Pedro's remodeling of among these, the Court of the Maidens (Patio de las Don the Alcazar, making it difficult to state precisely which parts cellas; Fig. 10) has a close architectural relationship with the of the Alhambra may have served as models for the Alcazar. Alhambra's (Fig. 11). This hall, as well as For example, the Alcazar's Hall of the Ambassadors (Fig. 8), others in the Alcazar, has stucco with sebka designs, stellar

92 FIGURE 10. Alcazar, Court of the Maidens before excavation, 1359-1369 with later additions (photo: author).

FIGURE 9. Alhambra, Hall of the Ambassadors, 1354-1370 (photo: author).

geometry, lozenges with inscriptions, windows with stucco tracery, and muqarnas vaulting. The large rectangular court yard is open to the sky and surrounded by an arcade of pointed polylobed arches resting on double columns that are tripled where extra support is needed in the corners. Ana Mar?n Fidalgo, the Alcazar's principal historian, had speculated that the courtyard was originally divided by water channels in a quadripartite (chahar bagh) plan and was paved in the sixteenth century when the palace was altered to con form to the taste for Italianate style.21 Excavations in 2002 FIGURE 11. Alhambra, Court of the Lions, between 1370 and 1390 (photo: author) confirmed that the pavement of 1583 covered aMudejar sunken courtyard from Pedro's era, which in turn replaced an earlier Islamic garden. The Mudejar garden was bisected by paved walkways with a broad channel running down the center that, while typical of Islamic and Mediterranean architecture, and terminating at each end in a rectangular pool (Fig. 12). was not at all characteristic of the dark, enclosed castles of The walkway was sunk about a meter below the level of the the Iberian north. The recently excavated courtyard and sur sixteenth-century pavement, and the two symmetrical beds rounding architecture resemble not only the garden in the Casa were recessed by an additional four meters.22 The unusual de Contrataci?n but also the Alhambra's Court of the Lions, depth and the blind polylobed arcade that wrapped around the which also was originally sunk by a depth of at least a meter inner face of the beds bear a close resemblance to the garden and a half.23 The Patio of the Maidens and the Court of the in the Casa de Contrataci?n, which has been dated on the basis Lions are alike with respect to their surrounding arcades of of textual and stylistic evidence to the early twelfth century. slender columns in groups of two and three, lacy pierced stucco, Crossed axes in the courtyard are articulated on the the relation of roofed to open space, and the axial relation to arcade by taller, wider arches. These openings lead to side side chambers. Here again the chronology is a surprise: the chambers that are axially connected to the courtyard yet spa Court of the Lions was built by Muhammad between 1370 tially separate. Like the side chambers, the arcade is spatially and 1390, at least four years after Pedro's addition to the Al ambiguous, for it defines neither interior nor exterior space cazar.24 Hence, the Court of the Lions could not have served but a kind of third space, simultaneously interior and exterior, as the model for the Court of theMaidens. Instead, the model

93 for viewing the landscape panorama surrounding the palace. These architecturally constructed views were strategically placed so that the sovereign could look down on the agricul tural landscape that he supervised and beyond to the horizon of the kingdom that he ruled.27 At the Alhambra, the view be came a metaphor for political centrality and sovereign power. However, the Seville Alcazar was more self-contained. Al though this palace complex included extensive gardens, it lacked topographical elevation and thus offered limited op portunities for viewing the landscape from a panoramic per spective. Second-story windows looked into the enclosed courtyards below, and it is possible that the Court of the Maidens enjoyed a horizontal view along the central garden axis that extended into the Hall of Ambassadors at its west end, through the outlying gardens and perhaps beyond, un impeded by the walls of the modern barracks added long after FIGURE 12. Alcazar, Court the Maidens, excavation of revealing Mudejar Pedro's day.28 But it is clear that, because of its site, the Al garden, 1359-1369 or earlier (photo: author). cazar's architecture could not position Pedro, its Castilian patron, in the same way that the Alhambra's architecture ele vated Muhammad and his immediate predecessors. Conse could have been the or the Alhambra's Partal Pal quently, Pedro did not gain the actual performative strategy ace, both built in the first half of the fourteenth century by of the Alhambra from his Mudejar palace, but rather an resonance. Muhammad V's predecessors. associative In other words, the Alcazar succeeded The chronology of the halls highlights the complexity of because its inhabitants had already seen the Alhambra's Cuarto the interchange between these two patrons. Pedro was surely Dorado, Partal, Hall of the Ambassadors, and Generalife and emulating Muhammad, whose Alhambra was an enormous could read it in those terms, despite the difference in land palace that set the standard for opulence, beauty, and comfort scape and other spatial disparities between the two. in the fourteenth century. Indeed, there are many instances Many visual signs prompted the association between the of Christians copying the luxurious architecture and style of Seville Alcazar and Nasrid architecture: arcaded courtyards living of their Muslim neighbors.25 Unlike smaller Islamic with pools, arches with stucco, the ambiguous inside/outside palaces, like the Aljaferia of Saragossa and the Castillejo of spaces, and brilliant tile in geometric designs. Both palaces no Monteagudo, or enormous palace cities like Madinat al-Zahra' displayed the Nasrid motto in Arabic, "There is conqueror that lay in ruins, the Alhambra was a palatine city that con but God." Finally, Arabic inscriptions in the Alhambra praised tinued to dazzle Muslim, Christian, and Jewish visitors for theMuslim patron whereas in the Alcazar they praised Pedro. re more than two hundred years.26 Moreover, it grew from a plain And one of the capitals in the Alcazar, a piece of spolia was fortress guarding a small palace to a densely built yet elegant used from one of the earlier Islamic palaces at the site, precinct of multiple palaces with courtyards and gardens set inscribed with part of a Quranic verse (sura 3) that begins "In within an enclosure wall capped with tower-miradors. There the name of God: There is no God but God, the living, eter ever . . was nothing of such magnitude and luxury in the Christian nal, self-subsisting, sustaining. ,"29 ruled kingdoms of the north. However, in the south, Pedro The inscriptions at the Alcazar are puzzling. Why would and Muhammad were building roughly at the same time; so a Christian monarch wish his palace to communicate in Ara much so that it is possible to see the Court of the Maidens as bic and sing the praises of theMuslim god? Such inscriptions a rehearsal or even progenitor of the Court of the Lions, not are found in other Mudejar environments, as in the Cordoba as a copy. synagogue (first half of the fourteenth century), where they One distinctive feature of the Alhambra that the Alcazar seem equally out of place. While the Hebrew text clearly lacked was the exploitation of elevations to cause water to dominates on the walls, in less prominent places brief Arabic flow from one hall to the next. This is a profound difference inscriptions state, "There is no God but God" (Fig. 13). Like that most historians and architects do not even notice. But the wise, at the "El Transito" synagogue in Toledo, built about traveler M?nzer mentioned it, noting that while the Alhambra 1357 by Pedro's Jewish treasurer, Samuel ha-Levi, the shields was built on a high hill in a mountainous landscape, the Se of Castile and Leon are interwoven with Hebrew and short ville Alcazar sat on a flat plain. This affected not only the Quranic verses.30 While from a modern perspective the intru flow of water within the palace but also the relationship of the sion of a Quranic verse in a Jewish synogogue appears start palace with the surrounding landscape. The Alhambra's many ling, for the medieval viewer?including Jews who identified gardens and halls had specially designated alcoves (miradors) themselves as Andalusian?there was nothing contradictory

94 in the presence of such formulaic phrases that, after all, sup ported the monotheistic doctrine of Judaism. Similarly, in the Alcazar, the phrases "There is no conqueror but God" and "There is no God but God," written in Arabic, were perfectly in accordance with Christian beliefs. The big question here is not why Pedro tolerated Arabic religious phrases in his palaces but why he preferred theMu dejar style and why he chose it for his seat of government. One explanation for the adoption of Islamicate forms is the "default theory." According to this, Pedro adopted the Mu dejar style simply because the artisans of Seville, who were trained traditionally from father to son, knew how to build it.31 In other words, he employed the best labor in town?mu dejares?who knew how to make elegant stucco, wooden muqarnas, delicate arcades, glazed ceramic tile, and sunken gardens with ornamental pools because they belonged to a continuous tradition that dated to the era of Islamic rule. This hypothesis supposes that Arabic theological inscriptions appeared simply because they were in the repertoire of the FIGURE 13. Cordoba, Synagogue, Arabie inscription, first half of 14th cen artisans Pedro employed. But arguing against this is the fact tury (photo: author). that artisans both from Toledo, who made the doors to the Hall of the Ambassadors and other wooden fittings, and from Granada also worked at the Alcazar. In other words, Pedro did exercise choice in selecting the best among diverse groups jar, because Pedro remodeled not only the Alcazar of Seville near in northern of Mudejar artisans skilled in crafts such as stucco work, but also the Palace of Tordesillas was Pedro's wood carving, and tile making. The default argument implies Spain. The Palace of Tordesillas built by father was contem a lack of selectivity, whereas the evidence points against this. between 1340 and 1344 and remodeled by Pedro the it The "triumphalist theory," which we examined above, poraneously with the Seville Alcazar.32 Like Alcazar, and of the points out that Pedro's father, Alfonso XI, had built the Hall has delicate stucco, polylobed arches, tile, many Al of Justice, the first Mudejar portion of the Alcazar immedi decorative features associated with the Alcazar and the was committed ately after winning a major battle against combined Islamic hambra. Tordesillas shows that Pedro deeply reasons armies. For Alfonso, Mudejar was a means of appropriating to the Mudejar and that he chose it for of personal Islamic art to show its subjugation and domestication. How taste and meaning. means another ever, while the triumphalist argument may explain the initial What an architectural style suggests yet have been attractive to phase of Mudejar remodeling of the Alcazar, it does not explanation. The Mudejar style may account for the motivations of Pedro. Muhammad was, after Pedro not only for what it was but also for what it was not: the Sabio all, his ally who had lived at the Alcazar and sent him artisans it was not Gothic. In the thirteenth century Alfonso in an amicable exchange, albeit one in which the respective had chosen the Gothic for his renovation of the Alcazar was a and cultural positions of dominance were well understood. The sultan's because it visible sign of both religious Alfonso the iden sojourn at the Alcazar seems to have prompted the renovation difference. By choosing the Gothic, Sabio that occurred two years after his visit. The triumphalist expla tified himself with the Christian north, the Reconquest, and to That which nation, which persuasively accounts for the use and meaning particularly the pilgrimage trail Santiago. road, across to the shrine of of Mudejar art objects, does not explain theMudejar phenom stretched from northern Spain a enon in architecture because it cannot logically be argued that , gave rise to chain of churches, of the Mudejar was a sign of both hostile subjugation and friendly cathedrals, and monasteries under the patronage Cluny, accord. earlier ones built in the Romanesque style and then, beginning This suggests another explanation: the Alcazar was really in the late twelfth century, the Gothic style. Gothic cathedrals the idea of Muhammad and should be regarded as the Alham such as those at Burgos and Leon were impressive works of bra's architectural progeny. But we have seen that this expla architecture in which structure and ornament were harmoni more nation, while partially correct, does not work chronologically ously combined, but they reflected the style of Paris the because the Mudejar phase of the palace was begun earlier than specifically Iberian architectural conditions. Unlike under Pedro's father, and Pedro's patronage predated much of Romanesque, Gothic owed little or nothing to Islamic al were Muhammad's patronage at the Alhambra. It also does not ex Andalus. Itwas an import whose cultural roots northern the his plain the enthusiasm with which Pedro embraced the Mude and unequivocably Christian. Alfonso Sabio, despite

95 reputation for great learning and his interest in Islamic knowl edge, had a lot at stake in being Christian: after all, when he took the throne in 1252, Seville, which was politically impor tant, and Cordoba, which was ideologically meaningful, had been conquered (or "reconquered" in Christian eyes) only a few years earlier. In contrast to Alfonso, Pedro was more secure in his role as Christian ruler, perhaps because by the time of his reign, Seville had been in Christian hands for a century. His enemies were not his Muslim neighbors but his own family members, many of whom wished to kill him. Although a hundred years earlier Alfonso the Sabio had espoused the Gothic for its north ern Christian associations, Pedro may have spurned it because of its French, non-native, associations. Both Pedro and his fa ther hated the French and had fought bitterly with the church leaders of Castile and the Avignon papacy over their respec tive marriages and illegitimate children. Pedro had battled for the right to succeed his father as king of Castile and had thor oughly alienated the French when in 1353, after two days of marriage, he abandoned his Bourbon wife, Blanche, and re turned to his mistress, Mar?a de Padilla. Thereafter the French supported his half brother, Enrique de Trast?mara, in a suc cessful campaign to unseat and ultimately assassinate Pedro.33 Mudejar as an official style for churches and palaces began at the same time that Gothic emerged. Mudejar churches were typically built just off the pilgrimage route, where church patronage was more local, more Spanish than French. In Teruel (Aragon), for example, several churches FIGURE 14. Teruel, Church of San Pedro, tower, 1319 (photo: author). were built with rectangular brick towers that looked like min arets. The Church of San Pedro (1319, apse begun 1383) had facades adorned with recessed blind arches in aljimez pairs century, much of the Iberian peninsula had been conquered, set within rectangular frames, sebka interlace, and sparkling the political threat of Islam was greatly diminished, and the glazed ceramic inlay (Fig. 14).34 In distinction to the Leon rulers of newly conquered territories found themselves the Cathedral (second half of the thirteenth century), which closely stewards of built landscapes that were profoundly Islamic in resembled such French prototypes as Reims Cathedral with character. Rather than erase the well-constructed fortresses and flying buttresses, groin vaulting, stained-glass windows, and city walls and the handsome palaces and mosques that they tripartite portals with didactic sculptural tympana, the Teruel encountered, the new Christian rulers appropriated these works towers persuasively expressed the idea of "Spanish" identity.35 and converted them to their own use. The degree of respect Nationalism as a concept is generally attributed to the shown for Islamic buildings is remarkable. For example, after rise of nation-states in the modern period, but in Spain the the conquest of Seville in 1248, the prayer hall of the Seville anxieties about cultural, or "national," identity began much Mosque was not replaced by a cathedral until 1519, and even earlier when, in the ninth century, the Islamic threat had pro then the Giralda minaret was preserved and used as a bell voked the ideology of the Reconquest with St. James (Santi tower. And when the Cordoba Mosque was disastrously re ago) the Moorslayer as its emblem. The saint served not only modeled beginning in 1523, the architect who gutted part of an evangelical purpose; his figure became a sign of Christian its interior was severely criticized for poor judgment by his identity and resistance in the face of the more politically pow patron, Charles V.37 erful and culturally attractive Islamic culture in the south.36 The Mudejar style was probably adopted in northern The French invasion in the twelfth century elicited similar Castile, Leon, and Aragon as a form of resistance to increas anxiety, even though the religion and church politics were ing French dominance and may reflect divisions in political Christian. The alternative to the dominance of French culture allegiance among the Christian royal families. As noted above, was to seek an indigenous Iberian identity, and that proved Pedro may have admired theMudejar style because itwas not to be Andalusi. This shift in anxieties can be attributed to Gothic and therefore not imbued with French identity; how changes in the domestic political balance that occurred between ever, it is also possible that he chose Mudejar because it was the eleventh and thirteenth centuries. By the mid-thirteenth identifiably Andalusi?like Pedro himself. By his time, the

96 Islamic kingdom of al-Andalus had shrunk to Granada and And while architectural style can and does move, it often its surrounding lands. The rest of what had formerly belonged retains its place-specific association.39 Thus, the adoption of toMuslim kings was ruled by the kings of Castile-Leon and Islamicate forms in the architecture of both Teruel in the by Portugal in the far west, and the surviving Islamic build north and Seville in the south gave those buildings a specif ings had been converted to Christian use. Pedro himself had ically Andalusi identity. They referred to territory, regional lived most of his life at the Seville Alcazar in the shadow of identity, and history?terms that together define "patrimony." the great Giralda minaret; indeed, he worshiped in a church that Furthermore, architecture can be more localized and particu still bore the physical form of a mosque, and he had every lar than a portable object, despite the difference in scale, in right to think of himself as Andalusi. In the Alcazar he enter the sense that a palace provides the spatial frame for the king tained in gardens from the Islamic period that were laid out as a specially designated individual and his performance of in the four-part chahar bagh plan, with channels of running sovereign rule.40 As the physical extension of his body, the water, fountains, and sunken beds with orange trees that grew palace is a unique and, especially when the palace was built from cuttings cloned from cuttings that had been brought to by the inhabitant himself, even a personal representation of the Iberian peninsula by Muslims centuries earlier. him. However, although Pedro's architectural taste was for Pedro's reasons for choosing to model his palace in an Mudejar, he was willing to patronize the Gothic style in other Islamic and specifically Nasrid style were complex and mani forms of art. For example, the Cr?nica Troyana, which was fold. It is important to recognize that in his reconstruction of begun for Alfonso XI by the court illuminator Nicolas Gon the Alcazar, Pedro exercised choice. The Alhambra's patron z?lez, was completed in the reign of Pedro.38 This manuscript was his vassal and an ally who offered design advice and sent has Gothic-style paintings illustrating the classical Latin expert artisans for the desired stucco work. But Seville also story of the siege of Troy. Clearly, while Pedro enjoyed the had good artisans of its own, and experts in wood could be Islamic style of opulent living among gardened courtyards, obtained from Toledo. Although the Seville Alcazar lacked he continued to perceive his own historical roots in Europe's the dramatic landscape of the Alhambra, nonetheless the ar classical past. This willingness to patronize different styles in chitectural affiliation with the Alhambra was unmistakable. different media indicates that Pedro did not insist on a single Finally, in addition to the specific local resonance between artistic policy. On the one hand, the patronage of the French Granada and Seville, there was the question of how to repre Gothic style inmanuscripts can be attributed to the traditional sent Iberian Christian identity without seeming like a poor training of workshop masters: artists were skilled in that style French imitation. Pedro's decision to adopt Mudejar was not and produced accordingly (the "default theory" of artistic made by default; rather, it expressed an important aspect of production). But on the other hand, the discrepancy between his cultural identity that transcended any religious associations. painting style and architectural style can be explained by the By the fourteenth century, the Islamicate artistic forms of Mu difference between the portability of manuscripts and other dejar were perceived, not as religious signs, but as cultural an sense art forms and the fixity of architecture and landscape. Be expressions that conveyed emerging of "national" cause architecture belongs to a specific geographic site from identity that, even today, finds its strongest expression in which it does not move, it is firmly identified with that place. .

NOTES

1. A recent example is New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Art, Al-Andalus: The Art of Islamic Spain (New York: Metropolitan Art of Medieval Spain, A.D. 500-1200 (New York, 1993). The exag Museum of Art, 1992), ed. J. D. Dodds; M. Menocal et al., eds., The geration of cultural polarities?European versus Arab?is analyzed in Literature of Al-Andalus (Cambridge, 2000). However, Jerrilynn Dodds S. Fanjul, Al-Andalus contra Espa?a, 4th ed. (, 2003), and again has noted that, until quite recently, historians of the medieval period in La quimera de al-Andalus (Madrid, 2004). have marginalized Iberian culture or ignored it altogether (Architecture and Ideology in Early Medieval Spain [University Park, PA, 1990], 3 2. A. Castro, Espa?a en su historia; cristiano, moros y jud?os, 2nd ed. and 118 note 17). For a critique of the most recent books on Andalusi (1948; , 1983); P. E. Russell, "The Nessus-Shirt of Spanish convivencia, see M. Fierro, "Idealizaci?n de al-Andalus," Revista de History," Bulletin of Hispanic Studies, XXXVI (1959), 219-225; T. Glick libros, XCIV (October 2004), 3-6. and O. Pi-Sunyer, "Acculturation as an Explanatory Concept in Span ish History," Comparative Studies in Society and History, XI (1969), 3. On ethnicity, see T. Glick, Islamic and Christian Spain in the Early 136-154; New York, The Jewish Museum, Convivencia (New York, Middle Ages (Princeton, 1979); on gender and religious identity, see 1992), ed. V. Mann et al.; New York, The Metropolitan Museum of D. F. Ruggles, "The Mother Tongue: Race, Gender, and Acculturation

97 in an Andalusian Dynasty," Journal of Medieval and Early Modern 25. Jerrilynn Dodds has shown that Islamic culture was the envy of north Studies, XXXIV (Winter 2004), 65-94. ern Spaniards from the tenth century onward, and that the brilliance of the arts, literature, science, and architecture was as much a threat to the 4. A. Mar?n Fidalgo, El Alc?zar de Sevilla (Seville, 1990), 37. north as the religion of Islam or its expansionist political agenda; Ar 5. A. Mar?n "Sevilla: los reales in C. An?n Ibid., 39; Fidalgo, Alc?zares," chitecture and Ideology. and J. L. Sancho, Jard?n y naturaleza en el reinado de Felipe II (Ma 26. For a description of these palaces, see Ruggles, Gardens, Landscape, drid, 1998), 338-343. and Vision, chaps. 4 and 7. 6. Mar?n Fidalgo, "Sevilla," 335. 27. Ibid., 181-191; idem, "The Eye of Sovereignty: Poetry and Vision in 7. Mar?n on these see D. F. Gar Fidalgo, Alc?zar, 62; gardens, Ruggles, the Alhambra's Lindaraja Mirador," Gesta, XXXVI (1997), 182-191. dens, Landscape, and Vision in Islamic Spain (University Park, PA, 28. This hypothesis was suggested to me by Mercedes Maier, president of 2000), 141-147. The dating of the garden in the Casa de Contrata the Spanish chapter of the Mediterranean Garden Society. It is untested, ci?n is speculative: it may belong to the late Almoravid period or?es but by plotting the line of vision against modern construction on an ur pecially in light of the recent excavations in the Alcazar's Court of the ban map, it should be possible to determine where the view stopped. Maidens?may possibly belong to the palace's Mudejar phase. 29. Al-Qur'an, trans. A. Ali, rev. ed. (Princeton, 1988), 51. 8. This part was remodeled again in the sixteenth century so that the Gothic 30. F. Cantera de C?rdoba character of the palace, which must have been pronounced in the thir y Burgos, Sinagogas Toledo, y (Madrid, teenth century, was obscured. 1973). 31. The names of some of the are recorded, such as 9. The inscriptions are "Allah is the refuge," "bliss," "eternal prosperity," Mudejar bricklayers Master Half and Master Mahomad See Mar?n Al and "Praise Allah for his goodness," translated in J. C. Hern?ndez Nu Agudo. Fidalgo, cazar, 89, E. Amirola, "Noticias de los Architectos" nez and A. J. Morales, The Royal Palace of Seville (London, 1999), 8. citing Llaguno y (source of article not given). 10. A. de los R?os, El estilo mudejar en arquitectura, ed. P. Guenon (Paris, 32. The Tordesillas thereafter became a convent. On Tordesillas, 1965). palace see V. L?mperez, "El Real Monasterio de Santa Clara de Tordesillas," 11. D. F. and inMedieval Beatus Ruggles, "Representation Identity Spain: Bolet?n de la Sociedad Castellana de Excursiones, X-XI (1912-13); Manuscripts and the Mudejar Churches of Teruel," in Languages of C. Garc?a-Fr?a Checa, "El Palacio mudejar de Tordesillas," in Los Al Power in Islamic Spain, ed. R. Brann (Cornell University, Occasional c?zares reales, ed. M. A. Castillo Oreja (Madrid, 2001), 73-97; Publications of the Department of Near Eastern Studies, no. Ill) (Ithaca, C. Robinson, "Mudejar revisited," Res, XLIII (2003), 51-77. 1997), 77-106. 33. C. Estow, "Pedro I the Cruel, King of Castile," inMedieval Iberia, ed. 12. O. K. Werckmeister, "Islamische Formen in Miniaturen des spanischen E. M. Gerli (New York, 2002), 633-635. 10. Jahrhunderts und das Problem der mozarabischen Buchmalerei," in 34. and inMedieval G. M. Borras Settimane di Studi del Centro Italiano di Studi sulVAlto Medioevo, Ruggles, "Representation Identity Spain"; Gualis, "El arte mudejar en Teruel y su provincia," in Castillas turo special issue, VOccidente e l'Islam nelVAlto Medioevo, XII (Spoleto, lenses (Instituto de Estudios Turolenses, III) (Teruel, 1987). 1965), 933-967; J. D. Dodds, "Islam, Christianity, and the Problem of Religious Art," in Art of Medieval Spain, 27-37. 35. Similarly, in sixteenth-century Aragon, where the prevailing fashion in private palaces was the Italianate style, Mudejar was the style adopted 13. T. Vann, "Salado, Battle of," inMedieval Iberia, ed. E. M. Gerli (New for public architecture because it expressed the idea of Aragonese pat York, 2002), 723; J. C. Ruiz Souza, "Santa Clara de Tordesillas. Nuevos rimony. See G. Barb?, "Mudejarismo en el arte aragon?s del siglo XVI," datos para su cronolog?a y estudio: La relaci?n entre Pedro I y Muham in Simposio internacional de mudejarismo, I Actas (Teruel, 1975) mad V," Reales sitios, CXXX (1996), 32-34. (Madrid, 1981), 166. 14. Hern?ndez N??ez and Morales, Royal Palace of Seville, 45. 36. J. D. Dodds, "Spaces," in The Literature of Al-Andalus, ed. M. Meno 15. 45. Ibid., cal, R. Scheindlin, and M. Sells (Cambridge, 2000), 89, citing Cr?nica ed. E. Fl?rez et al. 16. Ibid., 58. general, Espa?a sagrada, (Madrid, 1747-1918), XIX, 331. On the growth of the cult of St. James in general, see P. Linehan, 17. J. M?nzer, Viaje por Espa?a y Portugal, 1494-1495, trans. J. L?pez History and the Historians of Medieval Spain (Oxford, 1993), 95-127; Toro (Madrid, 1951), 62-64. R. A. Fletcher, Saint James's Catapult (Oxford, 1984). On the continued 18. M. Jacobs, Alhambra (New York, 2000), 87. resonance of the Reconquest in modern Spanish thought, see S. Fanjul, Al-Andalus contra Espa?a: la forja del mito (Madrid, 2000), esp. 24-54. 19. For critique of the term "influence," see Dodds, Architecture and Ide ology, 3. 37. L. M. Ram?rez de las Casas-Deza, Indicador cordob?s (C?rdoba, 1837), 197. 20. Hern?ndez N??ez and Morales, Royal Palace of Seville, 58-65. 38. F. M. Tubino, "Historia Troy ana. C?dice Historiado del Rey Don Pedro 21. Mar?n Fidalgo, "Sevilla," 342. I de Castilla," Museo espa?ol de Antig?edades, V (1875), 187-205; en 22. M. A. Tabales Rodr?guez, "Investigaciones arqueol?gicas el Patio P. Garc?a Morencos, Cr?nica Troyana (Madrid, 1976). On the subject de las Doncellas: Avance de resultados de la primer campa?a (2002)," of manuscripts, I am very grateful to Professor Michael Batterman no. in Apuntes del Alc?zar de Sevilla, 4 (2002) (www.patronato who sent me a photocopy of the Turbino article and, at the symposium alcazarsevilla.es; consulted May 2004). where this paper was presented, posed the question of whether or not artistic patronage is typically consistent across the different media. 23. Observed by Manuel G?mez Moreno and reported by J. Dickie, "The Islamic Garden in Spain," in The Islamic Garden, ed. E. Macdougall 39. For example, the terms "Egyptian," "Italianate," and even "Mudejar" and R. Ettinghausen (Washington, DC, 1976), 100. refer to styles that are firmly associated with geographic places.

24. Ruggles, Gardens, Landscape, and Vision, 191. 40. E. Kantorowicz, The King's Two Bodies (ca. 1957; rpt. Princeton, 1997).

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